


in my life

by orphan_account



Category: DC's Legends of Tomorrow (TV)
Genre: Abandoned Work - Unfinished and Discontinued, Alternate Universe - High School, Alternate Universe - No Powers, F/F, F/M, Implied/Referenced Underage Drinking, M/M
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-06-04
Updated: 2020-06-04
Packaged: 2021-03-02 23:08:55
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,818
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24444856
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/orphan_account
Summary: Sara Lance is the head of her school's GSA; Ava Sharpe leads the Young Democrats. John Constantine thinks he's cool because he listens to the Smiths; Zari Tarazi is worried no one thinks she's interesting. Nate Heywood and Behrad Tarazi are both definitely not attracted to boys. Mick has a baby, Astra has a crush, and Charlie has (and is) a problem. Gary and Mona are just here for the free food. In short, they're in high school; appropriately-aged hijinks ensue, including but not limited to theft, pining, and questioning facets of American liberalism.
Relationships: Behrad Tomaz | Behrad Tarazi & Zari Tomaz | Zari Tarazi, Charlie/Astra Logue, John Constantine & Astra Logue, John Constantine/Zari Tomaz | Zari Tarazi, Nate Heywood/Behrad Tomaz | Behrad Tarazi, Nora Darhk/Ray Palmer, Sara Lance/Ava Sharpe
Comments: 9
Kudos: 27





	in my life

**Author's Note:**

> Title from "In My Life" by the Beatles.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Bad decisions and new friends (not mutually exclusive).

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Title from "Townie" by the inimitable Mitski.

“This party blows,” Astra announced. She had (was? hid behind?) tired eyes and gaudy lipstick; she was fourteen and sick of it.

“You’ve never been to a party before,” John said, looking pained in a _you are an insufferable child_ way. “I promised your mum I would take you to a party. She said you need to go to at least one high school party. For your mental wellbeing and shite.”

This, evidently, was not the right move. “Stop trying to bang my mom!”

It should be noted that at this time, John was a skinny, grimy, Radiohead-loving, trenchcoated nicotine addict of a boy who would never dream of banging Astra’s mom, and he was at a party that truly did blow–and not in a sexual way, _thankyouverymuch Mona Wu_. Ignoring Astra, he walked into the next room. John leaned against a flimsy wall, definitely not intoxicated, trying not to look at swaying bodies a few meters away, oh, there was Zari, hair somehow floating on the proud tilt of her head, Zari who wouldn’t talk to him for some idiotic reason and whose skirt was really quite ugly, what was she thinking, but somehow it looked good on her, in a purely aesthetic way, it was her bone structure or something, and who was she dancing with– And. Well. Astra’s accusation, along with the aforementioned paucity of good vibes, may have contributed to the next action he took, which is to say elbowing Charlie in the ribs.

“Ow!” and there she was, Charlie, great friend of his heart and all that, but John was feeling reckless; he wanted to burn something big but not too big, and so he pointed at Behrad, who had been a little kid a few months ago but was now lanky and handsome in a kind of nebulously stoner-cum-James Bond way.

“He,” said Charlie, “is a youth. I cannot impugn his pure pubescent beauty, like Zeus kidnapping Ganymede.” (The subtext here: I am trying to be a good person, but Behrad Tarazi is really very attractive. Also, I’ve been watching too many period dramas.)

“He,” said John, “is a year younger than you, and he’s objectively hot, and you know it would be amusing. I need something amusing.” (The subtext there: I am fifteen, I am very much convinced of my own inherent evilness, and I have difficultly listening to other people.)

Charlie sighed, the sound infused with a heavy dose of _I don’t need much convincing, but I’m going to pretend that I do for my own dignity_. Walking up to Behrad, she grinned at him, a little crooked, saying “hey,” and he was so very easy. She arranged her fingers (no longer callused, her guitar sitting in the musty little corner of her bedroom, Lachesis patting her on the shoulder) around his arm, looked into his large dark eyes, okay, those were ridiculous, cartoon-character huge.

Behrad, meanwhile, saw Charlie, and thought that she was a pretty girl, in a kind of punk rock and boyish way, hair sticking up, very clearly only in it for the laughs. She had come over a few times last year, back when Zari was a normal fucking human being and had normal fucking friends, or rather weird friends and not the aggressively normal people with whom she associated now. “Hey,” he said back. It would be fun, he guessed. He had never kissed anyone before. Was kissing people fun? Behrad looked over at Nate, all cowlicks and strong jaw, skin that looked soft, voice that he knew almost as well as his own, _hey Behrad_ , always kind to his (ex-) girlfriend’s little brother, now pining for Zari from across a poorly lit kitchen-slash-living room. Behrad grabbed Charlie’s hand. “Let’s go.”

\--

Nate was indeed pining for Zari, knuckles (white) grasping a nonalcoholic beverage (orange) in one hand and the kitchen counter (grey) in another. She was just so pretty and smart and interesting and nice, and she just made him feel so happy, like his heart was flying out of his chest or something, or like he had somehow reconstructed every nose on every ancient statue, and he had just put all of them back on. He knew this wasn’t the most romantic metaphor. Nate had tried to explain this to Ray recently over the phone, and Ray had been very understanding, without complaining at all about how it was 3 hours earlier in California. “Nate,” Ray had said (and here Nate had imagined him sitting next to him, a familiar presence), “Nate, what you and Zari had was very beautiful, and I don’t doubt that you miss her. But are you sure that you want to keep going after her?”

“She’s not the same person anymore,” Nate had lamented. “It’s like she’s forgotten _us_.” He had felt very sad at this moment. Ray had made clucking noises and reassured him that he was sure Zari hadn’t forgotten anything, probably she was just adjusting to her new lifestyle of, uh, having a lot of perky white female friends. Nate had heard Ray whisper to Nora, whom he called then for this purpose, “That’s not offensive, right,” and after she had made a lot of exasperated noises that indicated “no,” Ray had very audibly sighed and said, “But Nate, what I’m trying to say is that no matter whether you get back with Zari or not, you’re still my best friend, and I really miss you.” Then they had cried, and at the end of the call Nate had said through a stuffy nose, “I love you, man” and hung up.

Someone tapped his shoulder, and Nate swung around, almost running into the stranger suddenly standing very, very close.

”I’m Dion,” said the stranger, his smile shining slightly asymmetrically. “Who are you?”

\--

Astra was still standing rather sulkily alone in a fairly secluded corner of the house, thinking about her awful suburban bourgeois life and her awful suburban bourgeois mother, who wanted her to go to _parties_ to network or something, and who had said very ominously that maybe she should start thinking about college. It was even worse than when she had sat Astra down to talk about “sexual intercourse,” because at least then Astra had thought about Holden Caulfield saying “sex maniac” very clearly and convinced herself that sex was Not Real, but college was a Very Real thing that happened to people. For instance, her mother, who surely would have been very anti-establishment and interesting had it not been for college, was now a lawyer in a small-ish town that didn’t even have the decency to be dark and haunted. Astra sometimes found herself thinking that maybe it would have been better if she was an orphan. She knew this was a terrible thought. But really, how bad could orphan life be? Orphans had heroics and things—even if those stories were for children. All Astra and her stable household had was Holden Caulfield.

She tapped her foot against the ground, feeling the thump of the bass, feeling the crash of the other bodies in other rooms. No one was coming to talk to her. Why would anyone come to talk to _Astra_ , _Astra Logue_? (Astra was at that age where one feels very keenly that one and one alone is exempt from that overwhelming burden of being a human being in society.) It’s not like she would mind other people—or rather, she would—but she could understand why they weren’t there—or rather, she couldn’t. She felt drunk. She felt excruciatingly sober. She was at a party, and she wasn’t sure what she was going to do next. That is, she wasn’t sure until a girl seemed to materialize in front of her and articulated, in a resonant voice that seemed like it was Meant for Greater Things than high school parties, “Come with me.” And so she did.

\--

It would not be inaccurate to call Sara Lance a seasoned veteran of the high school experience. She was adept at navigating the landmines of pop quizzes, the rapid-fire battles of soccer matches, and the trenches of testing prep. And her special forte was the party, that singular and quintessential facet of pre-collegiate (and collegiate, but she wasn’t there yet) life. Sara was a master of beer pong and the keg stand, kissing girls and kissing boys, dancing and staying still in a particularly alluring way. She enjoyed it too: breaking hearts very kindly but without much thought, getting wasted, stumbling home with Nate and John and the rest, feeling like they were wading through a pleasant, foggy syrup.

So, then, a viewer who knew Sara fairly well, or who at least was obsessive enough to figure out her general character from a year of silent snatched looks, would be forgiven for their confusion at her present attitude, which is to say one of relative silence, muteness, melancholy. Ava Sharpe was one such viewer. (We will spare Ava the agony of saying to which previous category she belonged. Perhaps both.) She saw Sara, and feeling pity (maybe more than pity), walked up to her and tapped her on the arm. “Feeling alright?”

Sara lifted her head slightly. “Hi, Ava. I’m okay. How about you?”

”I mean,” said Ava, feeling like she was bungling this already, “I’m okay, but what I really want to know is, are you _okay_? I mean, is there anything I can do? For you?” 

And here was the thing about Sara’s smile: it always first emerged slowly, then accelerated into a large and radiant grin too fast for one to shield oneself. Ava thought dizzily that maybe this was what it was like to look at the sun too close—cliché, Sharpe, you can do better—or perhaps putting your hand near a flame. Sara looked at her, right into her eyes. “The best thing you can do is go out there and enjoy yourself, Ava.”

Okay, but it just wasn’t fair when Sara said her name like that, drawing out the two syllables, nothing like Ava’s own clipped voice: _Aaavaaa_. “I don’t want to enjoy myself without you,” and there it was again, bumbling girl, Sara’s eyes were so blue, and she was slanting them right into Ava’s, “I don’t want to, because you wouldn’t be there. Ah. I mean, you should enjoy yourself. With someone.”

Something flickered across Sara’s face. (Again with the fire and light metaphors? Really?) “I don’t need someone at the moment,” she drawled, smile gone from her eyes now. “I’m really quite fine.”

”Oh, sorry,” Ava muttered, all hope of whatever she had been wishing for in her dumb selfish heart lost. “I’ll leave you be.”

And she did leave Sara be. She certainly did not think about Sara’s eyes, or Sara’s smile. Sara’s inexplicable sorrow. Sara’s sudden closing-off. She went over to Gary. “Hey. Let’s actually party."

So it goes.

**Author's Note:**

> Edit: Looking back at this and... yeesh. I really don’t like it. It’s extremely unlikely to be updated.
> 
> Complain to me about these idiots on [my Tumblr](https://iridiumprincess.tumblr.com/)!
> 
> I love comments and especially constructive criticism! I know I’m not the best writer, so any tips would be appreciated.


End file.
